As My Own Son
by DigitalTart
Summary: Zuko Iroh dribbledrabbles. Updated as I see fit. As of Chapter 5, expanded to include the entire family.
1. The Price

_Takes place between episodes 2.14 (City of Walls and Secrets) and 2.18 (The Earth King)._

In Ba Sing Se, nobody stared. His scar was nothing. Boys younger than he came back from the warfront all the time with worse. The walk from his apartment to the teashop where he waited tables was thick with the blinded, the mute, the crippled.

Zuko had never seen battle. He had watched his father's advisers push marker-pieces across maps of the lands encircled by the uncrossable vastness of the ocean, heard them speak blandly of the casualty reports and structural damage. He had dueled, yes, fought a few skirmishes against the Avatar and his companions, yes, even been a bit player on the assault against the North. But he had never been in the thick of it, not the kind that decided the fate of cities and nations.

Once, foolishly, as a little boy, he had asked his uncle what it was like, expecting a long, drawn-out tale of heroic daring guaranteed to keep him up past his bedtime. But instead his uncle had gone very grave, suddenly looking so pinched and old in the flicker of the firelight. "If you never see it, my nephew, I will die a happy man," he said, and left without another word, forgetting their little ritual of extinguishing the lamps by turns until the room was left in velvety darkness.

It had hopelessly perplexed his child's mind, raised as it was on the steady beat of fanatical worship of the tank and the fist that made every timber in the palace hum.

There was a refugee sitting in the muck on the street outside the door to the teashop. A mother, he saw, clutching her ragged bundle of a child to the rough and ravaged flesh visible beneath the collar of her robe. He would not have stopped, but she glanced up at the sound of his tread on the cobbles, and their eyes met. The look she gave him was neither pitiful nor pleading. It was blank. Dead. Deviod of hope that she or the too-thin baby she held would ever wake from the nightmare of insatiable flame that swept her world away.

He fished a copper piece out of his pocket to drop in her begging bowl, and almost, almost understood.


	2. Every Gift Should be Cherished

"I won't be coming to dinner tonight," Zuko announced, and no one thought to challenge him. When a boy loses his mother, cousin, and grandfather in the span of a month and is then designated Crown Prince of the Fire Nation at the age of eleven, he needs, after all, his time.

He had one of the cooks prepare him a small picnic box and a canteen of sweet cider, as if he meant to take his evening meal in his favorite courtyard. But once beneath the spreading branches of the cherry trees, he set his dinner down and swiftly levered himself up the tallest to retrieve the package of food, water, coin, and servant's clothing he had secreted in the fork of a limb. Hidden from curious eyes, he unwound the ribbon that bound up his long hair, and replaced his fine clothes with a kitchen's boy's stained tunic and apron. After making his way back down to the grass, he reached up and tied a note to a leafy sprig with the strip of red silk in his hand.

Then, head bowed to hide his golden eyes from the gate guards, he went quietly to join the rest of the potboys as they shuffled home under the bloody light of the setting sun.

It was two days before his uncle discovered the letter flapping in the wind above the pond. It read: _I've gone to find her. I won't be coming back._

-ooo-

Iroh was met with crossed spears at the door his brother's private study. "Fire Lord Ozai left strict orders not to allow anyone inside without a formal request for an audience," said the guard. His voice was thick with shame, even muffled by the full helm. Iroh knew it very well. It was only by his good word to Fire Lord Azulon that man had been admitted to the royal family's personal guard.

"Prince Zuko has not been seen for almost two days," Iroh said. "Let me in, Quan." He looked at Iroh, then his partner, and in unison drew their speartips up and let him pass.

Ozai was at his desk, completing a stack of state correspondence in his flawless hand. He did not look up from his brush when Iroh entered. "I have no time for that foolish boy and his foolish whims. Since he has not returned to the palace whimpering by now, fetch him and see that he is reprimanded for this childish display."

Iroh felt a flare of rage tear across his numbed chest for the first time in weeks. "Reprimanded? For mourning? Are you mad?" he said, but his brother did not deign to answer, and calmly dipped his brush to begin a new line. "Look at me, Ozai!" he thundered.

He did so slowly, eyes narrowed, the shadow of a malicious smile on his lips. "It's no longer your place to command me, brother."

"Damn your politics! Have you no love for your son at all? His mother disappeared less than a week ago. He's out of his wits with grief, not acting to spite you!"

The smile faded, if it had ever been there at all. Iroh had never seen his brother any less than perfectly controlled, perfectly calculating. But his fingers were shaking as they held the brush handle, and the flimsy reed snapped in half in the pressure of his grip. "Father took her because of him. My _wife is dead_ because of him. She sacrificed herself so that pathetic boy could live on."

"Every gift should be cherished," Iroh said quietly, "for there are many that go wanting."

"Take yourself and your proverbs out of my sight, _General_," Ozai spat. Iroh bowed, barely as low as courtesy demanded, and left.

-ooo-

He found Zuko on the arduous pilgrimage road to the Temple on the crescent isle, his face sunburned and his legs and palms scraped bloody from the steep and treacherous climb. He refused to let Iroh tend his injuries, and accepted only jug of water from one of the soldiers before collapsing into the scanty shade of a gingko tree.

"Dad doesn't want me. _Nobody_ wants me," he said, staring hard up at his uncle after he had quenched his thirst. It was a challenge, one that made Iroh pause. He wished he could say yes, that of course Ozai loved him, as every father loves their son. It would have been a lie.

"I do, Zuko," he answered instead, offering a hand up to his mount. "I want you." He had failed his own son. He would not fail this one.

Zuko stood, gritting his teeth against tears of relief, and took it.


	3. It All Started With

I can't stop writing these things. Fcuk I have work to do. Eff eff eff.

The last two were pretty heavy—time for a stupid comic interlude! I love abusing Zuko, I admit it. It works so well for pathos. And HILARITY.

_Takes place slightly before episode 2.15 (Tales of Ba Sing Se)._

* * *

"This may be the most perfect metaphor of harmony amongst all the elements I've ever found," Iroh said, regarding the object in his calloused fingers with a sage's eye.

Zuko swallowed a bite of his perfect metaphor of harmony and gave his uncle a blank stare. "It's a sweetbean bun. It's not even a _good_ sweetbean bun."

"No, no, hear me out," Iroh said, and cleared his throat to begin reciting the embryonic proverb in the proper tone. "The fruits of the Earth give us flour; with Water it becomes dough; it is leavened with Air to feathery lightness; and finally placed over Fire to become…this expression of delicious unity!"

"Just eat it, uncle," Zuko said, without a trace, speck or even iota of humor. He'd spent the entirety of the last two years in a bad mood, finely honing his ability to suck the fun out of any conversation.

His tolerance for his uncle when he was feeling proverbial was never very large, and the events of the day had lopped it in half. Even by his high standards, today just sucked the back end of a buzzard-wasp. He could remember a good deal many days that were worse, objectively speaking, but few compared to this one in terms of the sheer volume of unrelenting annoyance. Rare was the man with the coordination and skill to wield two wicked broadswords in deadly unison. Rarer still was the one who could manage to do that but still cut himself shaving (twice), shut his thumb in a drawer, splash hot tea all over his hand when the lid fell out of the pot into the cup, and trip over a crack in the floor because that weird girl with the pigtails and huge rack had been _staring_ at him his entire shift.

"Did something happen at the—" Iroh started.

"No," he growled, and picked up his soup bowl and commenced to stab a piece of flat noodle to death with his chopsticks in an attempt to get it from his bowl to his mouth. Picking it up and drinking it would have been admitting defeat, and Zuko never gave up, even in the most idiotic of struggles. He continued stabbing.

"Let me make you some tea. I found the most delightful peach-blossom oolong—"

"NO."

"Really, Zuko, I think…"

"My _hands_ smell like tea and my _clothes_ smell like tea and my_ room_ smells like tea and my…" he trailed off, muttering angrily at his soup. His voice had the faintest hint of pathological emotional instability that makes people afraid that someday they're going to find you cackling outside the charred remains of your place of employment at two in the morning with an empty cask of gunpowder in your hands.

"Better than how you'd smell otherwise," Iroh observed, always ready to see the best of any situation. "Ah, bathtubs. How I miss them." Zuko glared, but Iroh had gone to work on his own bowl of noodles and didn't notice.

So he sat there and fumed a little. Since Firebending was now off-limits, his favorite method of stress relief, igniting any highly combustible items at hand (and when he was _really _angry, not-so-combustible items) was no longer available. He stared at the pot of dried flowers on the shelf above his uncle's head and tried to make it burst into flames by thinking at it. It didn't work.

"I'm done. I'm going to bed," he said finally, and stalked to the washbasin to deposit his dishes in it, then stalked to the door of his tiny bedroom. There wasn't much space to get a good stalk going, but Zuko managed.

"It's barely sunset!" called Iroh from his place at the table.

"I don't care. Wake me up when it's tomorrow," he said, and slammed the doors closed behind him.

Or he tried to. The tip of his finger was in the way.


	4. To Known True Fear

Set after Episode 3.2 (_The Headband)_

* * *

It was past midnight and still Zuko lay awake staring at the burgundy canopy above his bed. The same as he'd done every night for weeks. Since coming home.

Azula's reassurance in the throne room of Ba Sing Se rang more hollow every time his mind struck against it.

"He betrayed you."

"_He_ betrayed _you_."

What was so insidious was that the words were true—it was indisputable fact that General Iroh had conspired with the enemies of the Fire Lord, committing high treason against his own blood kin. Zuko had acted for the good of his people, and out of his loyalty to the man who should command it. He had chosen the right course.

But still he couldn't sleep, and his meals turned to sawdust in his mouth, because he knew Iroh never acted selfishly, and if he chose to side with the Avatar, it was for good reason. He had nothing to gain and everything to lose, and chose anyway. If Iroh was right, that meant that Azula, and by extension their father, were wrong.

It was also true that someday, probably as soon as the Avatar revealed himself again, that Azula would betray _him. _When she took up the strings there was no question her puppets would dance for her; Mei would plant as many kunai in his belly as Azula wished, a few kisses and a sunset picnic nonwithstanding. She might feel conflicted about it, but she would do it.

There was also a small part of him that whispered greater fears—whether Azula held their father's strings too, in hands blessed with wit and charm and flawless skill that matched the Fire Lord's own, no matter that she was a girl and second-born. His father had never defended him against anything—not against Azulon, and not against his own pride when Zuko had spoken out, justly, against his most trusted generals. His mother and uncle were the only ones that ever tried, the first dead and the second imprisoned behind thick walls of stone and his own stubbornness and spite.

Zuko was alone. Completely. And afraid.


	5. Marzipan

_Okay, I cheated. This one is Azula-Zuko, because I love her for entirely different reasons. Set pre-show._

* * *

"They're _MINE_," Zuko barked at the small figure crouched in front of him on the playroom floor, her chubby chin held charmingly on her knees. He was clutching the object of her desire to his chest so hard the tips of his fingers were white—a lacquer box of almond-paste candy, dyed and sculpted into fantastical animal shapes. Zuko was not a particularly cultured appreciator of the culinary arts, and to him they were special for another reason—they were a gift from Uncle Iroh, before he left on campaign across the Inner Sea.

"Please?" wheedled Azula.

"Go away. You ate yours already. "

Azula got to her feet, her sweetest and most winning smile in place on her lips, and wandered around behind the table at which Zuko sat. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and rested her head lightly against the back of his neck. "You're nice to everyone else, Zuzu. Why aren't you nice to me?"

"Stop calling me that, Azula. You're five. You're not a baby anymore," he said, and shrugged out of her loose grip. "Go bug Mom if you're hungry."

"Fine…" she sighed, and straightened. Zuko glared at her. As he watched, her smile shifted off balance, all the sweetness pouring off in a flood. She slid her feet wide and stiffened her small hands, eyes fixed on the small lamp that illuminated the two armies of clay soldiers Zuko had spread out to do battle.

"Azula, don't!" he hissed, dropping the box and bolting to his feet to grab her wrists.

He wasn't fast enough. With a sweep of her hand she drew a thin stream of the lamp flame out of its paper walls to brush in whisper-close spirals around the loose cloth of her sleeve. It flared ember red and charred immediately. She looked straight at him, then screamed as loudly as she could and collapsed to the floor in tears.

Ursa and one of her maids swept into the room a split second later. She took in the scene with wide eyes, her daughter curled up on the floor clutching her bare arm, smeared with ash, Zuko crouching over her. His mother's temper was difficult to kindle, but when lit it burned fiercely white-hot. She grabbed him by one arm and pulled him roughly away, her long nails digging painfully into his skin.

"You will _never_ do that again!"

"But Mom, I…"

"_NEVER!"_

"But she…"

"Cheza, take him to my husband and explain what has happened here. Prince Ozai will see to his punishment. I make no call for leniency."

-----

Later that night, Azula kicked the sheets off her bed and padded silently into the playroom. The box was still there, lying atop several porcelain Earthbenders broken to pieces by its impact. She slid the top away and selected a brilliant green sparrowkeet from its bed of tissue, pausing for a moment to admire it in the scant moonlight. With a satisfied grin, she popped it into her mouth and bit off its head.


	6. The First Virtue

_LIL' ZUKO FTW. Set pre-show._

* * *

Zuko felt like he'd been keeping vigil forever. It had really been scarcely more than an hour, but when you're five, sitting in one spot for an hour _is_ forever. The guards wouldn't let him up on the wooden watchtowers, so he'd plopped down at the base of one and annoyed the lookouts with frequents shouts of "can you see them yet?"

When one finally leaned over the rail and gave him an exasperated "Yes!", Zuko rocketed off to the interior gate to meet the Prince's procession. Most of it had peeled off to attend their own business on their progress through the palace grounds, and only Iroh, Lu Ten, and their personal guard were left, their clothes still heavy with the scent of salt spray and coal smoke.

"Uncle Iroh's back Uncle Iroh's back Uncle Iroh's buuuaaaaaaaa—hey!" Zuko yelped, for Lu Ten had intercepted the giggling boy and tossed him over his shoulder like a farmer might a sack of rice. Zuko wiggled a little in protest of the indignity, but only a little, because he did not actually want Lu Ten to lose his grip and drop him on his head. Lu Ten was a sturdy sixteen, and strong, but wriggling boys are still slippery handfuls.

"Sorry, Pip," he said, "but your uncle was wounded in the fighting. Gotta be careful with him for a little while."

"Not Pip. _Zuko_," he corrected empathetically, while repositioning himself in his cousin's arms so the edges of Lu Ten's shoulderplates were no longer digging into his ribs. "What's wounded?"

"It means hurt, nephew," Iroh said. "Hurt in battle."

"Oh," said Zuko, nibbling thoughtfully on one chubby finger and considering the sling and bandages that immobilized Iroh's left arm. "Next time, I should come with and protect you. I started learning my first Firebending forms while you were gone and I can't _make_ fire yet but…I practice hard."

Iroh laughed heartily. "That's very brave, Zuko, but protecting the Heir is their job," he said, indicating over his shoulder the two columns of guards in fearsome trihorned helms.

The one at the head, the captain, removed his and bowed low. "We'll do better next time, young lord, don't you fear. Your lady mother would miss you terribly if you had to come down to the South Pole and keep an eye on us."

Zuko looked skeptical. "You promise?" he asked, with as much gravity as his treble voice could muster.

"I promise," he said solemnly. The rest of the Dragon Guard within earshot were too well-disciplined to laugh, but their helmets hid no few smiles.

"Now that that's settled, I think I need food, then a bath. Or maybe the other way around," said Lu-Ten, setting Zuko down and starting off in the direction of his rooms in the royal family's private residence.

"Food in the bath, my son!" yelled Iroh brightly to his back. "Never pass up the opportunity for two good things at once in favor of only one!" Lu Ten turned to wave goodbye, pacing backwards and grinning at his father's shameless hedonism.

Once Lu Ten had rounded the corner, Iroh turned to his captain. "The campaign was cold and longer than I would have liked. See to it that they get something to chase the chill away, before we set out to sea again," he said, nodding at the men behind them.

The man saluted, his eyes brightening noticeably. "I'll see to it that the quartermaster looks into our supplies of Four Peak Reserve. And thank you, sir." The knot of men dispersed to their barracks, murmuring appreciatively at their commander's generosity, leaving Iroh and Zuko alone in the hallway.

Zuko crossed his arms over his chest and fixed his uncle with an accusatory stare. "You're going away again."

"As soon as my shoulder heals, yes, I'm afraid so. Come. Walk with me to the kitchens. I'll see if the cook can sneak us some coconut puffs before he sends them down to the banquet hall."

Zuko stuck were he was, an ominous storm building in his pinched lips and narrowed eyes. Tantrums rarely worked on Iroh, but he couldn't help himself, and this was important. "Why? You went away for a long time before! Why can't you and Lu Ten stay with me? It's boring here, and I don't want you to be…wounded anymore."

"You have your sister to play with, don't you?" Iroh said, skirting the question.

"I like playing with Lu Ten better. Azula bites," Zuko said, his fists still tensed at his sides and his face unappeased.

"Ah," Iroh said knowingly, and lowered himself to one knee. "I wish we could stay, Zuko, but our country is at war, and Lu Ten and I must fight. Fire Lord Azulon has commanded me to bring the other nations to bow before our banner, and I will gladly obey him. To do otherwise would be dishonorable to our great house."

The word 'dishonorable' meant little to his young mind, only that it was a nasty word to call someone, in the same class as calling his sister a 'sticky rat-baby'. "But you're a grownup. You have grey in your hair," Zuko said, his eyes passing briefly over Iroh's temples.

"That doesn't change anything. You don't know how much I want this war to be over, and Lu Ten and I safe at home with you. _Especially_ Lu Ten. But I will be leaving again, because that is the Fire Lord's will."

Zuko didn't like this, but he understood it. He strove every day to do as his father asked, and knew painfully well what it meant to fall short of those expectations. The life of the highborn was bound by duty and obligation—and like all men, from the most wretched of peasants to most powerful of princes, a son must obey his father. Kicking and screaming wouldn't change anything. He sighed and scuffed at the floor with his shoe. "How soon will you both come back for real?"

"Soon, Zuko" said Iroh, who disliked lying to small children and hoped he was not in the process of doing it. "Soon."


	7. The Perfect Prince

_This is as close as I come to writing shippy fic. Takes place after episode 3.5 (The Beach) and before 3.11 (The Invasion)._

* * *

It happened again.

At this juncture, Zuko was open to the possibility that perhaps, in a few select circumstances, his temper might be aversely affecting his quality of life.

_Just_ _maybe_. At any rate, it had recently caused Mai to dump a plate of nut brittle and several of her choicest pieces of sarcastic invective all over him and storm out of her solarium. Zuko flicked a chunk off his tunic. It pinged against a wooden chest and fell to the floor smoldering.

The palanquin bearers would be smirking about this for days. The reason for his explosion was so monumentally stupid it was almost painful—Mai's grandmother had interrupted them, with the utmost discretion, to remind Mai they had a reservation for a quite family dinner in an hour. Zuko was nowhere near ready to relinquish her, for his left hand had just departed on an exploratory mission beneath her undershirt and had yet to fully experience such exotic climes.

At that point, a simple: "She'll join you later. I'll see to it that you have a table." would have sufficed…but instead Zuko popped his head over the back of the sofa, glared at the aged woman, and snapped: "Get out of here, you old hag. Can't you see we're busy?"

She apologized with excruciating politeness and excused herself. In her own home.

Then came the scolding and the nut brittle, and he would be out one Mai for days instead of hours. He hadn't even meant it, really. The old woman was nowhere near as smothering as her daughter-in-law, and had been extremely understanding about the frequent visits the Prince paid to her granddaughter. She had three girls of her own, and Zuko was quite sure she knew exactly what sort of activities a young royal and an unescorted noblewoman would be indulging in. She knew and she left them alone, because she trusted Mai. He was too proud to chase after them and apologize, of course, so simply sat there feeling like an ass. Mai hated it when he acted like this. He didn't want her to leave, that was all. Didn't she understand? He was trying to protect her.

Yes, protect her—from some airhead navy brat she would never meet again. From her parents. From her own _grandmother_. And if she kept refusing? What then? He was crown prince. He had power enough that he had but to give the word in a fit of anger and she would be forced to submit.

Zuko bolted upright, feeling like he'd swallowed a mouthful of ice. He knew it so very, very well—disobedience to the Fire Lord was met with swift retribution, whether it be a son, a brother, a friend, a city, a nation. And he received what, in return? Unwilling hands and hearts full of nothing but hatred. Whatever gifts he bestowed or hollow pleasure he took would be tainted with it, and like his father he would walk on alone, to the end of his days.

That was the path of the perfect prince, what he had fought so long and so hard to set himself on. "I'm sorry, Uncle," he whispered. "You were right. All along, you were right."


End file.
